Black Belt Eagle Scout

Black Belt Eagle Scout is the moniker of Katherine Paul, a Swinomish and Iñupiaq musician from the Pacific Northwest whose work interrogates Indigenous identity through intricate guitar layers and reverb-drenched introspection. Emerging from the Portland DIY scene, Paul released her debut Mother of My Children in 2018 via Saddle Creek, a collection that paired fingerpicked arpeggios with meditations on belonging and erasure. Critics noted her ability to channel personal grief into expansive sonic landscapes, with The Guardian describing her sound as "quietly radical." Her 2019 follow-up At the Party with My Brown Friends sharpened the political edge, confronting colonial violence while maintaining melodic warmth. 2024's The Land, The Water, The Sky continued this trajectory, earning praise for its textural density and lyrical directness about Indigenous sovereignty. Paul's guitar work draws from slowcore and shoegaze traditions whilst remaining distinctly personal, her voice often low in the mix, refusing easy consumption. She represents a generation reclaiming narrative space through sound.